As soon as I arrived home, I hurriedly changed my wet clothes, made myself a cup of coffee over the spirit lamp, and then took out the piece of heel.
It was a broad, strong heel, with an iron rim round it, and entirely new, just like the sole. It did not seem to have belonged to the usual kind of cheap boots which our ordinary criminals are apt to patronize; at the same time it did not seem to have belonged to the better class of foot-gear. The heel somehow seemed to me to be familiar, a vague recollection of something set my brain to work.
Ah, suddenly I saw it all! The heel and sole belonged to the same sort of shoes, in fact they were a perfect match to a pair which had just helped the police to circumstantial evidence by an impression on soft soil in a similar case. It was the same kind of boot with which the prison society provides discharged prisoners, so that they shall not be entirely shoeless when they come out of prison.
One of the thieves must be a discharged prisoner, I went on reasoning. The boots are quite new; he must, therefore, have been just lately released,—in all probability yesterday morning. The burglary must have been planned and the necessary watch on the house undertaken by a confederate who, of course, must have been at large for some time previous.
Ten minutes later I stood in the anteroom to my office at the police station. It was not yet morning. The official on duty sat and dozed over the stove.
"Find out from the ledger, if any of our burglars have been discharged from jail in the course of the last two or three days," I asked.
It is, unfortunately, a fact, that a large majority of crime is committed by prisoners who have just been let out of jail, and we therefore carefully keep a register of those who are let loose.
In the meanwhile, I went into the guardroom and ordered two constables to follow me.
"Black John, the Throndhjemer, as you perhaps remember, sir, was discharged yesterday morning; I don't see any others.
"That's all right! find out where he hangs about when he is out."